Asthma management and environmental tobacco smoke exposure reduction in Latino children: a controlled trial.

OBJECTIVES: This study tested the efficacy of coaching to reduce environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) exposure among asthmatic Latino children.
DESIGN: After asthma management education, families were randomly assigned to no additional service (control condition) or to coaching for ETS exposure reduction (experimental condition).
SETTING: The study was conducted in San Diego, California. PARTICIPANTS: Two hundred four Latino children (ages 3-17 years) with asthma participated. INTERVENTION: Approximately 1.5 hours of asthma management education was provided; experimental families also obtained 7 coaching sessions ( approximately 45 minutes each) to reduce ETS exposure. OUTCOME MEASURES: Reported ETS exposure and children's urine cotinine were measured.
RESULTS: Parents in the coached condition reported their children exposed to significantly fewer cigarettes than parents of control children by 4 months (postcoaching). Reported prevalence of exposed children decreased to 52% for the coached families, but only to 69% for controls. By month 4, mean cotinine levels decreased among coached and increased among control children. Cotinine prevalence decreased from 54% to 40% among coached families, while it increased from 43% to 49% among controls. However, cotinine levels decreased among controls to the same level achieved by coached families by the 13-month follow-up.
CONCLUSIONS: Asthma management education plus coaching can reduce ETS exposure more than expected from education alone, and decreases in the coached condition may be sustained for about a year. The delayed decrease in cotinine among controls is discussed.

RCT Entities:   Population Interventions Outcomes